Daily Archives: August 5, 2009

Harold Meyerson has a bizarre column in the Washington Post today that leads you to think he was given an assignment stating, “write a column about how crazy Republicans are and emphasize that they are in the minority and super whacko and suggest that the filibuster is basically a mechanism used by these crazy people”.

He jumps from the town hall meetings that have white conservatives “whipped into a frenzy” and blacks and union members not in attendance (ps Harold, union members have good insurance. Unions may be for healthcare reform in order to save themselves money, but union MEMBERS aren’t necessarily believers) to the “birther” movement where he concludes:

I suspect they’ll conclude that this Obama-isn’t-American nuttiness refracted the insecurities and, in some cases, the hatred that a portion of conservative white America felt about having a black president and about the transformation of what many thought of as their white nation into a genuinely multiracial republic.

I’m curious as to what he thinks of the “truther” movement. Was it racism? Was it fear of the white male Fraternity member? hmmmmm

Anyway – the point of his column is to dis the filibuster. “it wasn’t even used much until 2006 and now Republicans are using it for minority rule!!!” UNFAIR.

Here’s the “unthinkable” part.
One day – sure, maybe it’s in the far, far distant future, but let’s put our imagination caps on and imagine that a Republican gets back into office and Republican take over Congress.
As Democrats, do you not want to have the filibuster? As Democrats do you want someone like President Bush being in charge of your healthcare? As Democrats do you want Republicans to create money out of thin air in order to pay for things like more prisons or a bigger war on drugs or a bigger military, or abortion control or land raping or…..whatever their agenda might be at the time.

The “government” is not Obama. Saint that he may be. (she says while rolling her eyes and suppressing a gag)
The “government” is also Richard Nixon, and Karl Rove, and George W. Bush and John Ashcroft. (picking names out of a hat that the left agrees whole heartedly are evil)

A large part of the policy debate boils down to this: Are you more worried about losing the freedom to pursue your family’s best health care strategies or about protecting long-term innovation?

UPDATE: Now that I’ve reread this post, the quote above doesn’t quite go so let me adjust it to fit.
Terri: ” Are you more worried about losing the freedom to pursue your family’s best health care strategies and protecting long-term innovation or about the national debt and saving money via health insurance reform?”